The Mathippuram slum has been chosen as the pilot project for implementing the Rajiv Gandhi Awas Yojna (RAY) in the state. Under the 76.35 crore project, all the families in the colony would be provided with new, individual homes with 24 hour water and power supply. To improve the infrastructure of the area, which is heavily dependent on fishing as the main source of income, a dry fish processing unit, a building for storing fish and provision for improved fishing equipment would also be carried out as a part of the project. If everything goes as per the plan, Mathippuram colony could very well become a model township with a library, a community hall, anganavadi and a health care centre. While the picture shows a bright future, the present situation at Mathippuram betrays a reality that has been overlooked all these years.

Location wise, the place where the colony is situated could be one of the most scenic spots in Trivandrum. Facing the blue waters of the Arabian Sea and the bay housing the fishing harbor, Mathippuram colony presents a sight that's appealing from afar, until you get close enough.

“Sometime over the early part of the last century, the British had built a fort further up from here known locally as 'Marunnukottai'. Since this area existed beyond the fort walls, it came to be called 'mathilppuram' which eventually became Mathippuram,” says the former Panchayath Secretary and current Secretary of Vizhinjam Jama-Ath M M Yosuf Khan.

The slum at Mathippuram is set in an area of around six acres, with 420 homes housing 1130 families. The Program Director of Urban Poverty Alleviation by Kudumbashree, Karthikeyan S defines a slum as a 'place of inhabitance with a population in the excess of 200 people living within one acre and which lacks any of the basic necessities like water, power and drainage facilities.'

Electricity reaches almost all homes in Mathippuram, but water reaches none.

“Water is being made available by private parties through trucks at a price,” explains Yosuf Khan. “A scheme was devised to bring treated fresh water to the colony from Vellayani Lake. The project was inaugurated in 2004 and commissioned in 2007. But the water that's being pumped through an insufficient number of taps is hardly fresh; it is brownish in color, and for good or bad, is not effectively distributed either.”

The colony is almost wholly devoid of any kind of bathroom facilities as well.